I am an African-American with a desire to inspire.

Diversity

Man, it has been a STRUGGLE trying to switch my body from my night shift schedule back to my regular daytime schedule.

I finished my last night shift of the week yesterday morning and headed straight for my bed to crash, only to wake up four hours later to get ready for my flight to Pittsburgh. Packing on four hours of sleep is not the best idea, just so you know. I had to force myself to stay awake the rest of the day as I got to the airport, got through security (there was literally nobody in line…it was just me. Had me feeling like some sort of celebrity 😎), ate a pretzel from Auntie Anne’s, flew to Pittsburgh (the view of the city at night is niiiiice), got picked up by some friends from college, went out to dinner with them, came back to their place, did some quick reviewing of the pediatrics residency program at Pittsburgh, FaceTimed my girlfriend and finally got ready to go back to sleep around midnight. I’m glad I decided to go through the torture of staying awake though, because I was knocked out about five seconds after my head hit the pillow lol. Then my stubborn circadian rhythm kicked in and I found myself up and awake in the middle of the night for about an hour for no good reason. I finally crashed once more and woke up much later than I would have liked. It’s all good though, I definitely needed the rest. I just got back from a diversity brunch that the pediatrics program here in Pittsburgh hosted, and will be going to a pre-interview dinner later on this evening that should help prepare me for my interview tomorrow. It should be a great time! 😄

As you can see, my interview season is starting to shift into high gear. After tomorrow’s interview, I have one at VCU next Monday, followed by a flurry of interviews taking place in the following weeks at Emory, Carolinas Medical Center in Charlotte, UNC, Duke, UVA, EVMS, MUSC and the University of Maryland. There’s going to be a lot of money spent on gas and plane tickets, that’s for sure. Good thing I decided to get a new credit card for this season; I’m tryna make some money off of all these expenses lol. It’s going to be fun to get to see all these different programs and to meet all sorts of people, but I also feel like my tank will be on close to empty by the time this interview trail comes to an end. Then I’ll be chillin’ for real!

But before I fully shift into high gear, I have to focus on completing my last week of my rotation at CHOP. It’s crazy that I’ve finally made it to this last week! I’ve experienced a surge of growth and newfound confidence in my clinical skills these past three weeks, a surge that I know will continue as I blaze through this final week. I’m grateful for having been able to rotate through this hospital and am also very grateful that after a five-month long stretch of back-to-back rotations, I’ll FINALLY be enjoying a hard-earned break from clinical responsibilities! I remember looking at my fall semester schedule back in June and being like, “Dang, this is about to be a hell of a ride 😅”. Back then, November had seemed so far away…but look at us now! WE MADE IT!!!

Before I forget, let me go on and tell you about my week of nights.

First off, it was strange having to be asleep in the daytime and being up all night (reminded me of my long nights during my Ob-Gyn rotation). I really felt like I was missing out on the events going on around me in the world. And at night when I was wide-awake, my phone was pretty much a brick in my pocket because everyone else was fast asleep while I was busy running around the floor admitting patients. It wasn’t like I had a lot of time to be on my phone anyway; I really was busy most of the night every shift. The team consisted of my senior resident, the intern covering the floor, and me. Yeah, just the three of us. Managing a floor that could fill up to a cap of 22 patients.

If we weren’t managing the care of patients who had already been admitted to the floor, we were working on admitting new patients onto the floor. Most of the time, we would be doing both of those things at the same time. In the rare event that we had some off-time where we weren’t being called for something, we would either be engaging in active learning with our senior resident, reading up on some information that we wanted to learn more about, monitoring our patients’ charts for any changes in their current statuses, or just talking about our respective lives. By the time the morning came around, I would be exhausted. Yet, I would have to stick around a couple extra hours most days to present patients that I helped admit overnight. I honestly don’t even know how I was able to get through those presentations…I sincerely felt like I was babbling nonsense due to fatigue, but I apparently wasn’t because everyone seemed to get the picture I was trying to paint with each of my presentations.

Overall, I actually enjoyed my night shifts! The whole flipping-my-schedule-upside-down thing sucked but once I adjusted to that, I could really begin to appreciate the laid-back, flexible nature of working at night. Oh, and shoutout to the cafeteria being open from 1-4 AM! That was extremely clutch, but it sure was tragic that it was closed from 7:30 PM till 1 AM 😕. I had even more independence at night than I did in the daytime, which is saying a lot because I already felt like I had a ton of independence during my day shifts. I also appreciated the fact that I didn’t have the time constraints that come with pre-rounding and rounding, which allowed me more time to have some touching conversations with my patients, read about things that I found interesting, learn how to be more effective in putting in the correct orders, and write some high-quality notes about the patients I admitted. I also practiced managing multiple patients overnight by splitting the patient list with the overnight intern, meaning that I took responsibility (with oversight of course) of the care of some of the patients on the list. I was really out there feeling like a doctor, and it was pretty cool!

I had a great experience on nights, but it sure does feel good to be back on a regular schedule again. It’s too bad that I won’t get to wear scrubs during the daytime and I’ll be having to wake up real early again, but at least I won’t be messing around with my sleep schedule! Plus, it doesn’t hurt to be looking fresh at the hospital with my bowtie game on 100%!

That’s it from me today! I hope that you have a fantastic week!

Cheers to my last week of clinical responsibilities in 2018! And Happy Veterans Day! A HUGE THANK YOU to those of you who have served this country!

“The most common way people give up their power is by thinking they don’t have any.” – Alice Walker

– Black Man, M.D.

P.S. – I FINALLY got my absentee ballot the day before Election Day. I had to sacrifice some sleep to get it sent out but it was well worth it, even though the House representative I voted for ended up not winning the election. After my harrowing voting experience, hearing an unsettling amount of horror stories from friends who have tried to vote, and witnessing dangerous levels of corruption and irregularities in the voting system, I’m committed to helping make some very necessary changes in the way elections work in this country. Don’t ask me how I’m going to help make a change, because I don’t know yet…but I’m going to think of something and become more engaged in voter registration and reform in the overall voting system. Hopefully the results of this election will serve to restore some sort of order and sanity in the government. Shoutout to all the elected newcomers to Congress who were inspired to run because they were absolutely sick of the current state of affairs in the country!

P.P.S. – I was able to check out Philly for a bit last Sunday in my severely limited free time! I got to run up the Rocky steps, had brunch at a Lebanese restaurant, had a photo-op with the LOVE structure at Love Park, walked around downtown Philly and visited the Barnes Foundation to look at a ton of original, expensive paintings that I don’t really care about. But it was free to go, and the value of all the art in the museum is estimated to be at about $25 billion, so I had nothing to lose by checking it out!

Now you already know that I couldn’t be up here in West Philadelphia without paying tribute to one of my all-time favorite actors! Shoutout to my man Will Smith, come out here and have brunch or something with a youngin’! 😄😎

Now that I’m all settled here in Philly after driving up here yesterday (TOLLS ARE THE DEVIL), it has finally hit me that my time in D.C. has officially come to an end. My final week at Children’s National was full of positive experiences, all of which led up to my residency interview there that took place on Friday! The interview day went by smoothly, even though both the morning traffic and the 1000+ traffic lights that I had to get through before arriving at the hospital tried to conspire against me 😒.

Throughout the day, I learned even more great things about the program than I had already known, which is saying a lot because, well you know, I spent a freakin’ month there. My fellow applicants and I were able to talk with current residents about the program, listen in on a presentation given by the program director (HE IS HILARIOUS 😂), meet the Chair of the Department of Pediatrics, get a tour of the hospital, and participate in a noon conference. Throughout the day, I had two separate interviews that felt moreso like genuine conversations rather than me being put on the spot in a glaring spotlight. Before I knew it, the interview day was over 😯. I think that it went well overall; hopefully my interviewers think the same! I honestly really lucked out with being able to schedule my interview on the last day of my rotation. This made the interview process here so much more convenient and it provided the perfect finish to my rotation experience.

In the days leading up to my second interview of the interview season, I helped treat as many patients as I could by taking histories from them, performing physical exams, obtaining informed consents from parents if necessary, presenting them to my attendings, providing an assessment and plan, and writing notes on each patient. In addition, I continued to take in the diversity of the patient population by having conversations with parents about where they were from and the things that brought them to the nation’s capital. The topic of diversity came up during the meetings I had with the Department Chair of Pediatrics as well as with the Residency Program Director throughout the week. In my conversations with them, they demonstrated how committed they were to creating a physician workforce that mirrors the diversity of the patients in this country. The program really seems to be taking active measures in this realm, which is something that I really appreciate.

Completely unrelated to the topic of diversity, I decided to get an environmental allergy test because why not? I had never had one before and there was a nurse who needed to get some training in performing allergy tests, so I went ahead and helped her out by being a guinea pig.

BRUH.

I was floored when I got my results back.

Turns out my allergy testing came back positive for just about everything that I was tested for 😂. And I’m not even exaggerating. According to the test, I have an allergy to:

Now don’t get me wrong, I don’t have to avoid all of these things. A lot of these came back barely positive. Plus, it turns out that my body has been sensitized to the vast majority of these substances. However, my biggest reactions came from dust mites and cockroaches. The reaction was so positive that even the healthcare providers I was working with were flabbergasted. I told them that I had never really experienced any allergy symptoms, but I did tend to sneeze a lot whenever I was cleaning an area that had a lot of dust. I just figured that was a normal reaction for everyone lol. Also for the past couple years, I’ve experienced itchy and watery eyes on a nightly basis but I attributed that to dry eyes after my Optometrist diagnosed me with that. My attending suggested that my eyes may be getting dry as a symptom of dust allergy and that I could be experiencing itchy eyes every night because of the amount of dust that accumulates on my face throughout the day. The fact that my symptoms go away when I wash my face only made her suspicion that much stronger.

So I guess I officially have allergies lol. When I told my girlfriend, she was thrilled to hear that she was no longer the only one who suffered from allergies 😂. I guess I should start having some Zyrtec on hand or something now. Or maybe I’ll just keep making sure my face is clean at night. Yeah, I’ll just keep making sure my face is clean. Cheaper than popping a pill everyday.

Although I’ll miss the outpatient life (it was sooo good to me 😭), I’m looking forward to my inpatient experience here at CHOP that I’m sure will be as unforgettable as Children’s National was. I’m within walking distance from the hospital, which is awesome because I very quickly learned that trying to drive and park around here is pretty terrible. And I gotta give a HUGE SHOUTOUT to my friends (they also happen to be fellow ‘Canes 😏) up here who have allowed me to crash with them for the next month! I deeply appreciate your generosity!! 🙏🏿🙏🏿🙏🏿

All done with this post! Bye for now! And I hope that your week is as great as the one that I’m hoping to have! ✌🏿

– Black Man, M.D.

“It is in your moments of decision that your destiny is shaped.” – Tony Robbins

P.S. – I just recently got hit by some voter suppression tactics and I’m still in shock about it. Worst part is that I have other friends who told me that they were affected by voter suppression as well. I can’t even imagine the number of people out there who are going to decide not to vote because of the inconvenient difficulties that can spring up unexpectedly while trying to do so. Best believe that I’ll be on the phone with someone this week about this. North Carolina better give me the absentee ballot that I applied for over a month ago…they messing with the WROOOOOOONG ONE 👊🏿👊🏿👊🏿

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How am I already halfway done with my rotation here at Children’s National?

Those first two weeks flew by so fast man, I swear. I feel like I’ve just started to get comfortable with the flow of things, only to have to start preparing for my next away rotation in Philly that will start in a couple of weeks. The traffic here still sucks, but I’ve been able to manage it more efficiently than I did the first week, especially since there wasn’t a torrential downpour every day like there was the first week. I’ve become acclimated to the workflow in both the allergy and immunology clinics and have done the best I can to help all the providers out by interviewing patients, presenting them, and writing notes on them. I’ve also continued to increase my knowledge base on the presentation of various allergic & immunologic conditions as well as the management of them. (Netherton syndrome will forever be ingrained in my memory. So will Eosinophilic Esophagitis.) And of course, I can’t forget to mention the amazing degree of diversity that I’ve witnessed in the clinic. It feels like I’m meeting someone from a different country every day! I’ve also been seeing patients from just about all levels of socioeconomic status. Overall, I feel like I’ve been getting a great sample of America’s diverse population these past two weeks.

Clinic has been keeping be really busy, but I’ve absolutely loved being able to interact with the kids who come to clinic. Some of them are hilarious man. One kid got super excited when I told him that I found Mickey Mouse in his ear and Pluto in the other ear. When I told him I heard Donald Duck quacking in his stomach, he about lost it. 😂Another little kid who was hesitant about performing an oral food challenge warmed up to me after we bonded about Power Rangers and Spider-Man lol. He also got excited when I told him I saw the red power ranger in his ear. I don’t know why kids love having things found in their ears…what they need to be finding is a way to remove all the wax they like to make in there. 🙃

Not only do I like to play with the little kids, I like talking with the older ones too. There aren’t as many older children who come to clinic, but I just about always have a great interaction with them when they’re there. They tend to be very knowledgable about their condition, and I’ve found that some of them are much more mature than their age. There was one patient who was literally teaching me about her rare condition and how she has managed to live with it her whole life. The way she was talking, I kept forgetting that she was over a decade younger than me. God bless her.

Outside of clinic, I got the chance to attend a Grand Rounds discussion that touched on the topics of informed consent, social media, and effectively interacting with parents who try to take over their child’s medical care. I was also invited to an underrepresented minority dinner where residents and faculty discussed the subject of burnout and how it tends to negatively affect minority and women medical students & physicians at a higher rate than other populations. The chief medical officer was also in attendance and it was awesome to see not only how well-respected she was by everyone, but also how willing she was to take feedback in order to improve the experiences of the minority residents and faculty members at the hospital. Burnout is so real, and I’ve been very fortunate in that I haven’t really experienced it so far. At least I don’t think I have. 🤔 I have God, my mindset, my girlfriend, friends, family, mentors, mentees and my blog to thank for that. It takes a village y’all, always remember that. Nobody can go through a process like this alone, it’ll eat you alive.

Overall, D.C. has been a great time so far (I’ve already been to brunch a couple of times and have quickly realized that I can NOT afford to keep doing that 😅) and I’m excited to make the most out of my next couple of weeks here! I’m going to be sooo busy though; I have A TON of one-on-one meetings to attend as a requirement of the program I’m currently in. However, I’m really looking forward to them because they are all with various leaders of the hospital! I’m also starting my residency interview trail this week, with my first interview being back at my home institution! This means I need to hop on a quick flight back to Winston on Tuesday evening, only to return back up here Wednesday evening. That’s going to be fun lol. Oh and I’m also going to have the opportunity to go on a field trip to Capitol Hill on Friday with the other students in my program (they’re all my friends now 😊), where we will meet with the Legislative Assistant to Senator Cory Booker to talk about legislative advocacy and health! I’m really looking forward to that experience!

That’s it from me! Here’s to another week of the grind!

“Time is the coin of your life. It is the only coin you have, and only you can determine how it will be spent. Be careful lest you let other people spend it for you.” – Carl Sandburg

– Black Man, M.D.

P.S. – The Canes are really trying to make a statement out here with that win against FSU! The game shouldn’t have been that hard, but a win is a win! Too bad it was also overshadowed by Kavanaugh’s appointment to the Supreme Court, even after fierce, legitimized opposition. Jesus. This country needs to be saved.

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I just needed to let you know in case you weren’t already aware. My experience in the nation’s capital so far has been fantastic!

First off, I’ve been able to learn so much in my first week of my Allergy & Immunology elective at CNMC. Like, SO MUCH. I thought that I had a good understanding of what food allergies were and about the overall mechanisms of various allergic and immunologic conditions. Turns out that my understanding was basic at best lol. There’s definitely more to the specialty of allergy & immunology than meets the eye. Not only have I become aware of conditions such as FPIES and Omenn syndrome, but I’ve also learned the necessary steps that need to be taken in order to diagnose and treat both food and environmental allergies. In addition, I’ve quickly become comfortable taking an allergy history and teaching families how to use epinephrine to treat an anaphylatic reaction. I must have been doing a great job or something because one of the mothers of a patient kept telling me how sharp I looked and how good of a role model I was to her teenage son. My heart melted even more when she told me how proud she was of me, before proceeding to tell her son that he could be a doctor too in case his basketball dreams didn’t work out.

The education that I have been receiving has only been made better by the kindness of the providers that I’ve been working with. Everyone has been so relaxed and willing to help me not only acclimate to the workflow, but to also help me understand concepts that I’ve been curious to learn about. The chill atmosphere in the clinics I’ve worked in so far has allowed me to feel comfortable enough to truly take advantage of all the learning opportunities that have been offered to me. Also, I can’t adequately talk about my experiences without mentioning the diverse array of patients that I’ve seen. The cultural melting pot that makes up the city of D.C. is simply phenomenal. I’ve probably seen patients from over ten different countries this past week, no exaggeration. As a matter of fact, I don’t think any of the patients that I saw on my first day shared the same race or ethnicity. It’s amazing to be able to meet and treat people from many different backgrounds. I really want to be able to continue treating such a diverse array of patients throughout my professional career.

Outside of clinic, you could catch me either reading up on articles related to my elective, prepping for interviews, getting work done for the SNMA, or catching up with friends that I haven’t seen in a long time (between Friday night’s talent show at Howard and hanging out on U Street last night, there was a lot of fun to be had lol). Oh, and getting extremely frustrated trying to drive in D.C.

Bruh.

The traffic here can get horrendous. It didn’t help that it rained just about all day every day throughout the week. At one point, the mixture of heavy rain and traffic was so bad that it literally took me an hour to drive six miles. ONE HOUR. SIX MILES.

How absurd is that? And because I travel between two clinics for my rotation, I have to do a lot of commuting back and forth from the main hospital to the outside clinic. I’m seriously considering quitting driving in D.C. altogether and just using public transportation. But at the same time, driving myself around is very convenient, even with the traffic and all.

*Sigh*

C’est la vie.

Alright, that’s all I’m going to write today. Not too long, not too short. I’m looking forward to spending more time with my team in clinic, exploring the city more, and meeting up with other old friends while getting to make new ones. I also hope that these next three weeks don’t fly by too fast…🙏🏿🙏🏿🙏🏿

Make your week a marvelous one! And please, please, PLEEEAAASSEEE remember to register to vote if you haven’t already!

“When we seek to discover the best in others, we somehow bring out the best in ourselves.” – William Arthur Ward

– Black Man, M.D.

P.S. – As I was getting updates about the Kavanaugh hearings taking place last week, I eventually came to realize that this event that was being broadcasted across the nation was literally taking place about fifteen minutes away from me. Talk about surreal.

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I know it’s rainy/hurricane season and all…but that doesn’t mean it has to randomly rain EVERY freakin’ day. Like, the forecast for this week is straight thunderstorms every day in 90-degree weather. There’s a day where it’s “supposed” to be partly cloudy, but chances are that the floodgates up in the clouds will open up anyway. I’ve taken my umbrella everywhere with me, but I haven’t really had to use it yet because I refuse to go outside whenever a torrential downpour decides to show up. But OF COURSE, the ONE time I don’t have my umbrella with me, I get trapped in a downpour. I had to run almost blind from the gym back to my dorm soaking wet. I’m currently rolling my eyes as I think about it. *Sigh* Well hopefully it starts becoming sunny and beautiful again, although the humidity always ruins the fun. Can’t do anything about that though.

In other news, the first week of the Motivation program is already over! And it was a very successful week! I’ve (hopefully) already got the names of all the students down too! This group of students have been pretty interactive & inquisitive and all seem to be enjoying the program so far. They’ve also already been quickly put to work. With classes in Reading & Study Skills, Biochemistry, Microbiology, Anatomy Lecture & Lab (I can’t get away from these cadavers man), Histology & Health Equity Research, they really are getting a feel of the demands of med school. Before being put to work though, they had to go through Orientation where they were given the rules & regulations of the program, listened to a seminar on diversity and sat through HIPAA/Privacy training. The HIPAA training was, of course, full of important information that detailed how crucial it is to maintain digital security and different ways in which the secure nature of the medical center could potentially be breached. It’s kinda scary to think about how a simple mistake like leaving your laptop open and unattended for a few minutes could endanger the lives of so many people. Also did y’all know that there is a black market for stolen usernames & passwords? Someone can steal thousands of them and sell them to a bidder for a TON of money. Jerks. As important as the talk was, it wasn’t the most exciting thing I’ve ever sat through. If there was a way to make this training engaging and interesting across the board, I’m sure that people across the nation would greatly appreciate it. Hell, that’s a million-dollar idea right there for anyone willing to take that challenge on. Don’t let me beat you to making it happen 😉. The seminar on diversity was pretty interesting though. One thing that stuck with me from it was when the doctor presenting talked about having to learn from the diverse nature of all areas of life, no matter how ignorant the beliefs of some people may be. Just because you don’t agree with the beliefs or attitudes of a patient doesn’t mean that you can’t learn something from them. Besides, it’s mandatory that you care for each and every patient entrusted to you, so coming into contact with people that you may not agree with is very likely to happen…so might as well learn something from them, such as why these certain patients believe what they believe and what in society made them come to that viewpoint.

The students have learned quite a bit in each of their classes so far, but what I find really cool is the fact that they have been given an opportunity to be published via their Health Equity Research class. In this class, they’ll be able to choose a topic within health disparities that resonates with them, perform some literature research on this topic throughout the program and present it to the class at the end of the program along with submitting their manuscript to a journal for potential publishing. During the course of the class, they’ll learn how to use medical research sources such as PubMed, efficient strategies in regards to publishing research material, and how to read & write a literature review. I really believe that it’s a fantastic opportunity…so fantastic that I’ve even slightly considered doing it along with them 😅. We’ll see tho, we’ll see.

Finally, both the members of the MCAT prep and Motivation programs along with the TAs attended a day-long clinical rotation seminar last Friday. They were exposed to a clinical case and had to think through it while offering suggestions as to why the person in the case was sick. They were also told what to expect when they participate in their clinical rotations for the next five weeks. Along with that, they were given talks on what it means to be Hispanic and/or Latino as well as how to engage with these patients and on cultural identity and awareness in general. The day wasn’t all full of talks though. We all participated in a fun activity that involved the PACE Palette, which is a type of “personality test” that assigns a dominant color to your overall personality. (My dominant color was blue, which symbolizes Harmony. Lol.) I also received the honor to join a panel with five other medical students that worked to answer the many questions that were bouncing around in the students’ heads. That was a cool experience. Believe it or not, it still baffles me sometimes to think that I’m on the other side of the application process and that I’m exactly where most of these students desire to be. I was in their same shoes not so long ago, so I know exactly what they’re thinking and how they feel. I guess that’s one of the reasons as to why I’m really big on helping students that are trying to cross the barriers that stand between themselves and their goals.

2016 MCAT & Motivation Summer Programs

That’s all I have to say for today, thanks for reading!

Okay I lied, I have one more thing to say. You may have noticed that I’ve been rolling out new additions to this blog. If not, be sure to check these pages out by clicking on the left upper icon on the page! The sections that I’ve added include Useful Blogs, Good Vibes and Med School 101. Now that I have more free time on my hands, I’m able to do some of the things that I wasn’t really able to focus on during the school year. It’s all about growth man! I hope that they prove to be of some worth to you!

Have a delightful week!

“Believe in yourself and all that you are. Know that there is something inside you that is greater than any obstacle.” – Christian Larson

– Black Man, M.D.

P.S. – Please pray for the families and the victims of the Orlando shooting. We’re living in some insane times.

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It feels good to be back home in the 757 with friends and family after having to make a pit stop (more like a week-long stop) in Miami to attend two orientations for the program I’m working with this summer. I also randomly ended up at a concluding breakfast for an annual conference for the Association of Black Psychologists soon after arriving in Florida…but that’s besides the point 😅. The orientations I had to attend were spaced out three days apart with the first one being on Monday and the second one being on Friday. How convenient. The one on Friday was very useful and it directly related to the summer program. It got me even more excited to work with the students in the program. Free Dunkin’ Donuts and Panera didn’t hurt either. 😏 I only went to the one on Monday because the university made me. The info given to us in that SIX-HOUR long new-hire orientation session did not relate to me in terms of my summer employment. Being a current medical student and an alumni of the university, I was already familiar with the information that they presented, which ranged from university history to HIPAA, safety procedures and everything in between. Simply put, I really did not need to be there. But alas, I am a mere speck of paint in the spectacular mural that is the University of Miami. I also needed my name to be on summer payroll. So I silently suffered through it with my co-workers.

I guess I should elaborate a bit more on this program I’m working with huh? I’ve name-dropped it a few times but there are a few of you out there that probably aren’t too familiar with it…my bad! As I mentioned in a previous post (Testing My Brain on a Test on the Brain), the program is called the Minority Students In Health Careers Motivation Program, which is run by the Office of Diversity and Multicultural Affairs at the University of Miami Miller School of Medicine. This seven-week, tuition-free program is one of the three summer programs run by the office with the other two being the High School Careers in Medicine Program and the MCAT Preparation Program. The Motivation program is designed to resemble a “mini” medical school experience where the selected students (ranging from college sophomores to recent college graduates) take a sample of classes such as Anatomy, Biochemistry, Microbiology, & Histology. There is also an opportunity every week to participate in a discussion on a selected topic with a featured speaker while enjoying a free, catered dinner. Not only that, but the students are exposed to Health Equity Research, have the chance to attend supplemental workshops and have the opportunity to shadow physicians every week on clinical rotations. As if all that wasn’t good enough, housing & meals as well as metro transportation between campuses are all free for the selected students! What a program! The overall goal of this program is to promote diversity in the health field by providing students from underrepresented backgrounds an opportunity to develop skills that will increase their competitiveness when it comes time to apply to medical school. As a Teaching Assistant of the program, I’ll work with my co-Teaching Assistant and the Executive Director in facilitating the overall experience of the students in the program. I’ll be in the classroom each day with them and will assist the faculty in executing lectures and activities. I’ll also serve as a useful resource for the students by answering the various questions they will have and I’ll be able to share my experiences in medical school with them. Needless to say, I’m hyped about being able to work with the program!

In between going to the orientations, I won’t lie and say that I wasn’t enjoying my free time. From taking time to continue reading Black Man in a White Coat (I KNOW I’M TAKING FOREVER TO FINISH IT, DON’T JUDGE ME) to chillin’ at the beautiful Venetian pool with some great friends, I’ve been doing a lot of not-studying. It’s been glorious. I’m only gonna continue this period of relaxation, at least until I start the program next week.

I freakin’ love Summer!!!

I definitely can’t close out this post without shouting out the big homie and Doctorate of Education student, Mr. Donovan Livingston, for his incredible graduation speech (#LiftOff) at Harvard last week! You’re a clear example of a positive force and are an inspiration to many bro! I also appreciate you for being a supporter of this blog from the very beginning and keeping up with it weekly! Thanks for being an awesome friend and a great human being in general!!

As you may or may have not noticed, I don’t usually name-drop people in my blog for various reasons…but since he already done broke the internet and all, I figured it wouldn’t be a big deal this time around. If you haven’t heard his speech by now, you can click on the link below to check it out. I know you have five minutes to spare…so go ahead and click on it. You won’t regret it.

Have a fun and safe Memorial Day weekend! My appreciation runs deep for all those men and women who have sacrificed their lives to protect this country! Remember that this country stands because of the bravery and courage they exuded!!

Don’t chase people. Be you. Do your own thing and work hard. The right people who belong in your life will come find you and stay. – Will Smith

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IT’S SPRING BREAK BYYOTCHHH!!!

And it couldn’t have come at a better time. Okay it actually maybe would have been a bit better if it came a week later, which means it would have then lined up with the spring break of most universities that I know of…but no complaints here. I’ll take what I can get. This week I’m only focused on relaxing, having an unforgettable time down here in Miami, and recharging for the final block of my first year, which starts next week. 😳 I’m honestly feeling a mix of both excitement and astonishment at the same time at the fact that after this next block, it will be summer…meaning that I will officially be a 2nd year medical student. Wow. They say time flies by in medical school….well they weren’t lying. Better yet, it damn near flashes by. I’ve learned so much and although it feels like anatomy was a lifetime ago, it also feels as if I graduated from college last week. I actually still feel like a college kid at times that just happened to make it to the next level by the grace of God. I’ve already accepted that it will take a good while for me to fully mature into more of an adult mentality, so I’m content with happily living out my days as a youngin’.

Now about my Community Practice Experience last week. Lenoir, Lenoir, Lenoir. I’m not even sure where to start. It was definitely an unforgettable experience, to say the least. The clinical exposure I received at the pediatrics clinic was amazing, and I’ll be happy to go back for my second and final week later in October. The nursing staff was fabulous, the doctors were very willing to teach students and the patients were suprisingly overwhelmingly willing to allow me to interview them as well as physically examine them. As for the actual town of Lenoir…..let’s just say that it makes Winston-Salem look like a metropolis. I swear I saw black cows roaming around the front lawn of a house at one point while driving to the clinic. No offense to anyone that loves the countryside but in my opinion, the town looked kind of depressing… and the fact that it rained all throughout my first two days there didn’t help much at all. The rain also showed me the epic driving skills of Lenoir residents. Someone hydroplaned and rear-ended into my rental car at one point, and on another occasion somebody in front of me was really begging to get T-boned by another car. Jeez. (It was a minor dent in my car and I got everything taken care of in regards to insurance. Thank God for Trip Protection. 😊) I also just want to add that one of the officers that helped to take care of the rear-end collision assumed that I was a ball player from Wake. Typical. I politely corrected him and told him that I was actually a medical student that was on a week-long clinical rotation in Lenoir, which really surprised and impressed him. I love the responses I get whenever I completely flip a stereotype on someone. In Lenoir, a highway literally cuts through the town and the roads are typically full of trucks. (I absolutely HATE driving anywhere near trucks.) The town also went nighty-night around 9 PM at the latest and from what I experienced first-hand, there was an amazingly low amount of diversity. As a matter of fact, my classmates/roommates that were placed in Lenoir with me and I walked into a brewery at one point to get some 50-cent wings and to taste some of the local beer there. My group consisted of two Asian guys, an Indian guy, and two black Africans, including me. We literally WERE the diverse element in the brewery that had about 50 people in it at the time. I’m not kidding. Everyone else was white. We got a few stares as we walked in. 😐 It was kind of strange to me because I’ve always been in diverse environments, so being in an environment like that made me slightly uncomfortable. I won’t lie though, those wings were definitely bomb as hell. Plus the waitress served us with some good ol’ southern hospitality, so I had no complaints about that dinner. Also my classmates and I ended up having an interesting convo about race and how people decide to classify themselves/how society pressures all of us to check boxes of race in order to categorize all of us accordingly. It definitely proved to be an interesting conversation. Alas, I can’t talk about the finger-lickin’ wings without talking about the barbeque restaurant we went to a couple days later. My dinner there consisted of pulled pork with barbeque and specially made hot sauce, baked apples, mac & cheese and a roll. It was simply AMAZING. Plus the staff was the definition of southern hospitality. We will definitely be hitting that spot again in October.

In regards to my actual experience in the pediatrics clinic, I’ve really surprised myself on how comfortable I’ve become in obtaining an accurate history. I still tend to miss small things here and there, but I’ve also noticed how often patients conveniently tend to leave out vital information in an interview even after I specifically ask them for it. 😒 By the end of the week, I was literally interviewing every patient that came to the clinic to see my 2nd preceptor. Talk about practice. Backing up to the first couple days of my clinical experience, I quickly saw both the value of the clinic to the community and the closeness of the community as a whole. So many patients came in on a regular basis to maintain their health and the vast majority of them had some kind of relationship with both my first and second preceptors. I thought that it was pretty cool to witness how much the people in the community depended on the expertise of the doctors in the clinic and how vulnerable they were willing to be in order to maintain their quality of life. However, I’m not a doctor, nor do I look like one. So when I started interviewing patients on my first day, I made sure to wipe off the look of surprise on their faces by reassuring them that I wasn’t posing as a doctor or anything and that I was simply there to practice my interviewing skills with them. After that whole spiel, they tended to be more relaxed with me in the room. I also quickly realized how different it was to interview the guardian of a patient that couldn’t talk, like a baby. I had to shift my questions around a bit because I couldn’t ask the patient directly about how he/she felt. That was definitely a new and vital experience for me. My 1st preceptor made sure to ingrain in me that whenever I interview a patient, I should not be merely checking off a checklist. I should be able to walk out of the room understanding who the patient is and how he/she is suffering from their reduced quality of life. He also allowed for me to perform simple physical exam maneuvers on his patients, like the HEENT exam (Head, Eyes, Ears, Neck & Throat) and the respiratory exam. Note to self: Babies HATE having their ears looked into. To add to my unique experience, I saw circumcisions performed for the first time in my life while I was there. That…was….unexpected. My preceptor didn’t even warn me man. He just took the baby into a room with his mother and by the time I realized what was about to happen, it was far too late to brace myself. It looked hella painful. Poor kid.

My 1st preceptor was a pretty cool guy from Canada who bought me lunch and answered my many questions about medicine and the difference between the Canadian and the American healthcare systems. But he had to leave midway through my experience so I got paired up with another preceptor for my last couple of days who had a more grandmotherly approach to interacting with patients. She was very nice and willing to work with me, but she also did not hesitate to work me. She had me interviewing all of her patients and reporting to her their history before we would both walk in and see the patient again. I probably took a medical history of close to 25 patients in those last two days alone. Being exposed to these children so much also meant being exposed to various illnesses. 😰 I was constantly praying that I wouldn’t catch something from any of these kids who came in with illnesses ranging from a common cold to strep throat. Best believe, I was using hand sanitizer religiously and drinking massive amounts of orange juice. I’d be damned if I caught strep as soon as spring break started. There was one occasion where I was interviewing a little black girl and her mother about a condition the girl had. The girl really seemed to like me and was shy, but was also smiling and chirping answers to my questions whenever she wanted to. She was pretty fun to interact with. After that interview, my 2nd preceptor told me that I was a valuable asset to the clinic because she constantly sees little black children come into the clinic who neither have a positive male role model to look up to that looks like them nor has even been exposed to one. I wasn’t really expecting that statement from her at that moment, but it really moved me. Looking back on it, there’s a good chance that this little girl had never seen a black man in a doctor-like role before, and that maybe because of this brief exposure she was able to perhaps subconsciously attribute that she too could grow up to be in a similar role of success. I’m probably stretching it a bit, but it’s real awesome to ponder on.

All in all, I realized how chill the pediatric clinic lifestyle was. It was very low-stress and fun to work in. But just because it was chill didn’t mean that it wasn’t busy. It sure was busy most of the time. And the days were remarkably long. I would be in the office from around 8 AM to around 5:30 PM. That was a struggle to adjust to at first, but I adjusted a bit better as the week went on. Also, I haven’t heard so many babies cry in such a short span of time ever since those communal Cameroonian meetings I used to go to as a kid with my family. Bruh, I heard children screaming in my head as I lay my head to sleep at night on two separate occasions. That’s not normal.

I definitely had a very interesting week in Lenoir. But I was happy to leave in order to start my spring break, and I wasted no time in coming down to Florida to spend it. So with that said, please have a remarkable week!!

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First off, shoutout to all of you that actually read these blog entries. People have actually stopped me and told me how much they loved reading my blog, which pleasantly surprises me every time. Some have even told me they look forward to reading what I post every week! It may just seem like a nice compliment, but it actually means A LOT to me to see that my classmates, old friends, and family really enjoy reading these posts. Typing my thoughts out is really helping me organize both my experiences in medical school and my mind in general. I always have a thousand things going on in my head and don’t really know what to do with it all, so this is helping quite a bit. I also hope I’m helping to inspire or motivate somebody out there in some way by pouring my thoughts out here. That’s becoming a bigger goal for me with these posts, because I know how it feels to be inspired…it can completely change your life. So to everyone that is keeping up with this blog and spreading the word about it, I APPRECIATE YOU!!!

Now about this test I took a couple days ago…

It was definitely harder than I thought it was gonna be. I felt that I had adequately prepared for it, but mannnn those brain lesion artery questions got my ass. That was the one thing I kind of skimmed over while studying…and I got like 10 questions about them. 😐 Plus they asked some questions in the weirdest ways and had strange answer choices. And y’all would be hella surprised at how many nerves we got in our heads. Bruh. They tagged SO MANY different nerves on the cadavers in the practical portion. Had me looking at those poor dead faces like:

All I can say is that I did my absolute best on that test. I’m not afraid that I failed or anything (failing isn’t an option, I worked too damn hard to get here), but I also don’t know if I did better than I did on my last test. You see, I’ve been playing this game with myself where I try and see how much higher of a score I can get on a test compared to my previous one. I’ve had a hot streak so far (1-for-1) and I’m not tryna break it lol. But we’ll see. It wasn’t a terrible test, because there was a good amount of info I was sure about…thing is, you tend to just really remember the shit that tripped you up.

Oh well.

At least I’m about to be done with anatomy after this last block! This last section is dealing with the arms and legs, which hopefully will be less intensive than the head & neck region we just got tested on. But because its supposedly less intensive, we got extra clinical skills sessions, case-centered learning sessions and medical ethics discussions packed into these next two weeks as well. The faculty were pretty much like, “Y’all thought y’all was gonna get off that easy?? Nahhh B, lemme serve you some more stress.” I swear they be laughing at us man. Smh. I just can’t wait till I get to see my girl again in a few weeks and to see my family during Thanksgiving. They’re slick getting me thru this last stretch of anatomy.

On another note…

I’ve been reading up on Black Man in a White Coat by Dr. Damon Tweedy, and he’s been saying some pretty interesting stuff regarding his experiences as a medical student in the 90’s at Duke. As a matter of fact, he’s talked about a few things that I can already relate to. One thing that happened to stick with me was when he talked about how “healthy” he was because of the fact that he had been skinny all his life and that he also played basketball on a regular basis for exercise. He admitted to having a “high-salt” diet and to not eating as healthy as he should be eating, but he never thought twice about it because he had a high metabolism and never really gained any weight. So he shouldn’t have anything to worry about right? Turns out sometime during his first year in medical school while he and his classmates were learning how to take a blood pressure reading, a classmate took his and found it to be at a hypertensive level. Not only that, but he learned that he was starting to have symptoms of kidney disease. After learning all that, he became highly distressed and started eating healthier as well as supplementing the exercise he got from playing basketball with running. He eventually got down to a normal blood pressure (120/80) and became much more interested in hypertension and why it was 50% more common in black people than in white people. He found different reasons that ranged from evolutionary scientists theorizing that the African slaves that were best able to retain water during the Atlantic journey to America were able to survive and pass along their genes (in the modern world, retained water can increase blood pressure in blood vessels) to public-health writers that commented on how a good proportion of blacks suffered many inequities in the health care system as well as on their “cultural differences in dietary and physical activity patterns.” The young Dr. Tweedy also started doing research with a faculty member that focused on lifestyle-based approaches on treating hypertension and heart disease.

When he talked about how “healthy” he was based on his weight and appearance, it stuck with me because that’s how I’ve been personally judging my health for years…I figured as long as I went to the gym regularly, avoided trans fats and maintained my weight range, I’d be good to go. But I’m learning that there is much more to good health than feeling healthy. It sounds very simple and intuitive, but here I am assessing my health based on appearance while blinding myself from other vital signs that matter. With an unhealthy diet, you can be as fit as a beach model and have a blood pressure of 150/100. It’s kinda scary ain’t it? Turns out one of the measures of gauging your true healthiness is taking your blood pressure and keeping it at a safe level. Reading what Dr. Tweedy had to say on that has also made me a bit more conscious of what I put in my body because I found that I have a pretty high-salt diet too…and when I practiced blood pressure readings with my classmates earlier this semester, I had a bit of a higher blood pressure reading than normal…😰😰😰. Now I’m finding myself examine in detail the sodium content of every food item I buy and I’m realizing there is a TON of salt in almost everything I like to eat. Great. Now I gotta cut back on homemade quesadillas, ham sandwiches, meatballs, and all the convenient processed foods I’ve been eating for so long. Ima have to be eating a damn apple for lunch and lettuce for dinner.

One more thing that has been randomly on my mind recently is the issue of racial categorization in America and across the world. I honestly don’t get it. How can you try and categorize a person’s ethnicity based on appearance alone? Who comes up with the rules regarding what a person’s ethnicity and race is? Is a white woman who was born in Ghana and whose parents, grandparents, and great-grandparents lived in Ghana not an African woman? Or is she still labeled as Caucasian because of her appearance even if the only culture she associates with is the Ghanaian culture? Or is an Asian-American man who only knows Swedish culture and whose ancestors happened to come from Sweden not Swedish because he has the ”stereotypical features” of an Asian man? How many of y’all automatically assumed I was talking about a Chinese-American man when I said Asian? Isn’t a man from India technically an Asian man? Or can a black woman born and raised in Germany not automatically be assumed as German because of the color of her skin? Does an American-born black woman with Japanese, Egyptian and French blood running thru her veins have to still check the African-American box because simply because she’s black? Is she not 1/3 Japanese, 1/3 Egyptian and 1/3 French? Or is she also “part-American”? Or is being American classified as a culture? Why does she have to be fractioned, can she not be 100% Japanese, 100% Egyptian and 100% French? Again I ask, who the hell controls these categorizations?? Are stereotypes really powerful enough to allow us to judge one another’s characteristics and nature based on appearances alone? Better yet, is the media responsible for reinforcing the stereotypes that control the way we think about one another? Does the media take certain aspects of different cultures, attach them to people of that culture and create the stereotypes that are ingrained in each of our heads?

Hell, maybe I’m crazy. I’m here asking questions that very few people, if any, actually have the true answers to. But it does get you thinking. I mean, I’m just as guilty when it comes to assuming what someone’s personality traits are based on appearances alone because I’m human like everyone else. I’m exposed to the media that everyone else is exposed to on a constant basis. I’ve had countless people tell me numerous things about people of other races and ethnicities throughout my lifetime. But I’ve made it, and continue to make it, a mission to break the habit of assuming what other people are like whenever I can by meeting new people and learning from their experiences and their respective cultures, which in turn helps to hopefully improve their ingrained perceptions about people that look like me. I just believe that there is much more to each human being on this Earth than their appearance. Each person has a story that is made up of a collection of their thoughts, experiences, habits, overall culture, etc. Will every person in the world realize that? Probably not. All I can do is continue to break down negative stereotypes and try to show people that we are all much more than what we look like.